While several people were being vaccinated on the wings of a Guatemalan Air Force plane, the Minister of Health, Francisco Coma, called for more people to go to the vaccination centers against covid-19.
According to the official, 85% of patients who have been admitted to a hospital for covid-19 from December 20, 2021 to January 7, 2022 did not have any dose of the coronavirus vaccine.
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For this reason, he insisted on the need to vaccinate the majority of the population to prevent complications when contracting the disease.
“The vaccine does not kill, on the contrary, it is saving lives,” said Coma and explained that he considers inoculation to be the most effective way to combat the omicron variant.
According to health authorities, the omicron variant has only caused hospitalization in 1.4% of cases, well below what the delta variant caused, which was 4 to 5%.
In the last hours, long lines of people seeking to receive the covid vaccine have been observed, but they have had to queue for several hours due to the influx and problems with the registration system of the Ministry of Health.
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Delayed vaccination
Despite the call of the Minister of Health, who assures that there are enough vaccines in the country to advance the process, Guatemala lags behind in comparison with the countries of the region.
Official data from the Ministry of Health are that as of Friday, January 7, 6.6 million people had already received the first dose and of these, 4.8 million have already completed the vaccination schedule.
Regarding the third dose, 199,827 people have received it in Guatemala.
But, in Central America all countries have vaccinated 50% of their population with at least one dose, except Guatemala, which has only reached 36%. Costa Rica is the most advanced with 77%.
Meanwhile, with the two doses applied, Guatemala is also the last place with only 26%. While Costa Rica has already reached 69% and El Salvador 64%, according to data from ourworldindata.org.
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